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I believe writing in the first person gets the reader closer to the character. As far as I know, this is generally accepted as true. That's not all there is to character development, certainly, but it gets the reader in a better mind-set for 'closeness' with the character.
The novel I am currently writing has a PoV who is not the protagonist. I am considering writing the PoV in first person, which I think would sound really good for the novel, but I'm wondering if this is going to remove the reader's focus from the protagonist.
I want to keep the reader's focus on the protagonist, largely because the PoV, in her current state, would not make a very good one. She is selfish, sometimes without even knowing it, and would almost certainly inspire thoughts of boredom or even anger in the reader if she was who the novel is about. But she's not. The novel is about the protagonist. I feel like I've made this distinction, and there is no threat of alienating the reader through my PoV.
Unless I write in the first person. Will writing the PoV in the first person draw my reader closer to her, away from the protagonist, and therefore further in general from the novel? It's my personal opinion that I can write in the first person and still keep the focus on the protagonist, but I want to make sure I'm not walking into a trap here.
This is not a duplicate of this question. The question isn't whether I can split the PoV and the protagonist. I know I can do that. This question deals with using the first person for that PoV, given that it is (generally) accepted that first person PoV draws the reader closer to the character, and the story is about the protagonist.
To future viewers: Choosing the answer was a toss-up between Mike C. Ford and WolfeFan; they both have excellent answers. I would also recommend that you look at what's answer. It has some interesting insights which could prove useful.
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It really depends on the novel that you want to write. I think the issue isn't with the distance from the protagonist by having the POV character as a secondary character, but rather that you will struggle to attain depth in the protagonist with this method.
If the protagonist is relatable, or interesting, or complex, then the reader will empathize with them and want to get to know them better if they are written well. Some of my favorite characters in conventional POV = protagonist stories are the side characters, and I finish reading wishing that the story was actually about them.
So the reader can feel like they are close to the non-POV character, but without being in their head it's impossible to know everything that is going on with them. Unless they communicate everything to the POV character/ reader, it will be impossible to know who they truly are, or how they see themselves. The reader will only ever experience the story and other characters through a filter.
Of course, this can be used very effectively as a method of character development (perhaps the POV character thinks the protagonist is a hero, whilst the protagonist believes s/he is a fraud and has just gotten lucky so far), but at the very least it limits the ways in which we can understand the protagonist further.
Ultimately you aren't writing a story about the protagonist if you choose to use this method. You are writing about their adventures, but the story is about how the POV character experiences those adventures, and their relationship together. It is a fundamentally different type of story for the reader, and offers both opportunities and limitations for developing the narrative and characters.
Please go ahead and write this character's scenes in first person. You clearly already want to do this. Even if you decide not to take this approach in your final draft, you will deepen your understanding of the character - and this depth will show in the story's final form, whatever form that may take.
Writing this character in first person will, in fact, draw readers closer to her. That's inevitable. This doesn't mean that your protagonist will suffer from lack of attention. Rather, it gives you some interesting opportunities to develop the protagonist. For example, you can show the protagonist's strengths in comparison to the more flawed PoV character, with the bonus of easily maintaining sympathy for the flawed character. You can allow the readers to learn rumors/lies about the protagonist, and wonder how true they are.
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