Nick Hern Books is to publish the scripts of each play in the Royal Shakespeare Company's upcoming Roaring Girls season, a series of rarely performed Jacobethan plays offering great parts written for and about women.

Staged in the Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, the season begins in April 2014, and features productions of the following plays:

• The Roaring Girl by Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton - a hilarious city comedy in which a young man, desperate to marry the girl he loves, turns to the fearless, feisty, cross-dressing heroine Moll Cutpurse for help (9 April - 30 September)
• Arden of Faversham by Anonymous - a darkly comic thriller. A woman determined to free herself from a miserable marriage by having her husband killed recruits a band of would-be murderers, but her scheme doesn't go entirely according to plan (30 April - 2 October)
• The White Devil by John Webster - a violent tragedy in which two ambitious lovers, snared in a web of corruption, passion and retribution, risk everything in their ruthless pursuit of personal gain (30 July - 29 November)

Completing the season will be The Witch of Edmonton by Dekker, Ford and Rowley, to be staged at the Swan Theatre from October.

Erica Whyman, the deputy Artistic Director of the RSC, describes the season as 'a celebration and a provocation', full of 'fantastic parts for women.'

'We are not going to solve the problems of gender inequality on the stage or in the world, but we are intent on asking some questions about both.'

The Roaring Girls plays will each be published in a Prompt Book edition, featuring the text edited for the RSC production, and introductions by key members of its creative team.