About character pointers in C

Question

Consider this definition:

char *pmessage = \"now is the time\";

As I see it, pmessage will point to a contiguous area in the memory contain

Answer 1

If you define a literal of the form:

char* message = "hello world";

the compiler will treat the characters as constant and may well put them in read-only memory.

So, it is advisable to use the const keyword so that any attempt to change the literal will be prevent the program from compiling:

const char* message = "hello world";

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I' guessing the reason const on a literal is not enforced as part of the language is just for backwards compatibility with pre-standard versions of C where the const keyword didn't exist. Anybody know any better?