This article reports on the development of the literary portfolio as an alternative to standard written tests in summative assessment of literary competences in the English as a foreign language (EFL) classroom. It is argued that traditional class tests put a too narrow focus on those aspects of literary competences that are more readily operationalized and thus lend themselves better to testing. This, however, may result in a negative washback on teaching. Building on, and operationalizing, the model of literary competence by Diehr and Surkamp (2015), the literary portfolio is designed to cover the various dimensions of this complex competence. At the same time, it tackles the problem that dealing with class readers often leaves students with little freedom to pursue their own (reading) interests or set priorities in working with the texts. The literary portfolio allows students to take responsibility for their own learning as they can choose a text from a shortlist, tasks to work on, and levels of cooperation with peers. As will be demonstrated in a case study carried out in an eighth‐grade intermediate‐level EFL classroom, the implementation of the literary portfolio entailed an innovative way of learning with literature in an autonomous learning environment.