The author Herman Melville and the poet Walt Whitman are

Accoring to the Essense of Style, (D) is in the right form.

But I am unsure whether I can apply here

First of all this is a different question.

aNalysis :
Eliminate (C) since named is incorrect usage
Eliminate (E) is incorrect since they are still icons had been implies they were till now.
Eliminate (B) is awkward without punctuation
Among (A) Vs (D) i go for (A) since in (A) it specifically talks about specifically one poet and one author and not a generic pair of author and poet as (D) does.

kindly explain me the difference between below given scenario :
Federer the tennis player is my inspiration
the tennis player Federer is my inspiration

Which is grammatically correct I think we can correlate this scenario here .Is it trusting the ear simply or is there any funda.

I agree with you.. A & B should be correct... I don't think this OG... what is the source????

This is MGMAT CAT question and the OE is

The original sentence is correct. The modifiers “Herman Melville” and “Walt Whitman” are restrictive – they are necessary to restrict the scope of the words “author” and “poet” respectively – and hence the use of comma pairs to set off the modifiers is not appropriate here. In addition, the context of the sentence implies that the men continue to be icons of American literature since they are beloved by generations both past and present; hence the use of the present tense “are” is appropriate.

(A) CORRECT. The original sentence is correct as written.

(B) The modifiers “the author” and “the poet” for “Herman Melville” and “Walt Whitman” respectively are non-restrictive – they are not necessary to identify the subjects and only serve to add information – and hence should be set off with comma pairs (e.g., “Herman Melville, the author, and Walt Whitman, the poet, ….”

(C) The phrases “The author named Herman Melville” and “the poet named Walt Whitman” are unnecessarily wordy. In addition, an icon of something has implied greatness; hence, the phrase “great icon” is redundant.

(D) The restrictive modifiers “Herman Melville” and “Walt Whitman” are improperly set off by comma pairs.

(E). The modifiers “the author” and “the poet” are non-restrictive and properly set off with comma pairs. The tense of the verb “had been” is not appropriate since it is implied by the context of this sentence that the men continue to be icons of American literature.