maspower:
On grad school. A lot of top writing programs do waive tuition and stipend fairly generously, so you don't necessarily have to take on debt to get an MFA. These programs are usually pretty selective too, but it's worth mentioning. And yeah, getting a professorship without an MFA (or some impressive publication history) is not really viable anymore. Some places will probably even want a Doctorate in writing (not a lot of those, but more than there used to be). Just some food for thought.

True story.