Literally?

So Anne told me that tonight on NPR, some woman talking about a book had this to say: "And she quite literally poured her heart out onto these pages..."

Quite literally poured her heart out? Really? You're telling me that, as she was writing, she carved her own beating heart out of her chest and dumped it onto the sheet of paper? Wow. Personally, when I need tips on writing, I tend to turn to Strunk and White rather than ancient Mayan sacrificial rites.

People sometimes think that "literally" is just a word that adds emphasis, like "really" or "seriously". It's not. Use it only if the imagery you're employing should be interpreted without any metaphorical or idiomatic layers of meaning.